Components of this type serve as glazing elements for horizontal, inclined or vertical glass installations as room closing elements in roof and ceiling openings or facades. A disadvantage of the previously known components of this type is that they have poor physical construction properties as well as poor U and G values. In addition, they result in a construction with many potential weak points such as, for example, the adhesion or weld points in heat-insulated glass block connections, as well as rubber seals, joints, overlaps and weatherboard panels which are critical for the penetration of water.
Further disadvantages are poorly insulating concrete and mortar, as well as the glass blocks themselves which, as hollow bodies, conduct heat via their glass walls and allow radiant heat to pass directly through them due to the untreated pressed glass property of the glass blocks.
Due to the small unit of area and the heterogeneous static bond with the concrete/mortar and the reinforcement it is therefore difficult to produce components of the type specified at the start which have good heat and sun protection insulation and at the same time withstand the static transfer of force over long periods of time without any damage. Damage generally occurs due to the glass blocks, as pressed glass hollow bodies, becoming permeable and taking in condensate, as a result of which their visual and physical construction properties are lost.
Unlike insulating glass made of plate glass, the surface areas of glass blocks made of pressed glass are a multiple smaller, and so only the interaction of the whole heterogeneous system over a very large structural depth can lead to good physical construction values.
Attempts to produce better insulating glass blocks with direct adhesion of glass block onto glass block, possibly with a pane of glass adhered in place, have failed because the static loading of a component produced from such glass blocks allows the adhesion to become permeable, and the heat-insulating properties are extremely minimal. Moreover, with this it is necessary to seal off the various passages that occur from water and also to keep them sealed over long periods of time.